Trade Aid

Making a World of Difference

Making a world of difference

Trade Aid - Little Bag/Big Difference

PROJECTS

Support for ongoing projects has continued unabated in 2018 and now into 2019, further establishing the influence that Trade Aid UK has been able to give to important relief programmes worldwide. Much of this has been enabled by the continued sale of Trade Aid UK Granulated and Caster Sugar through Tesco Stores and online at Ocado together with the sale of ethical travel insurance through its partner www.travelandinsure.com. The use of external aid agencies and charities has been instrumental in us being able to reach the remotest parts of the globe where often the needs are greatest. The individual aid projects supported by the Trade Aid UK Foundation can be viewed by simply scrolling up and down the project panel on this page and clicking on the project that interests you.

Water Filtration Units

Through the charity Links International, we have provided essential funding to purchase water filtration units to help bring clean fresh water to remote villages, initially, in Uganda. The units work by a simple filtration system which will take any water, no matter how polluted, and by a gradual overnight process will filter a bucket of filthy water into water totally fit for human consumption. The filters work on a small scale so that each family in a village can have their own supply.

In 2008, we increased our ongoing support for the provision of more water filtration units into Uganda and then into the Indian sub continent. This was part of a larger charity led programme to extend the provision of these units into other countries in Africa, the Indian Sub-Continent and South America.

Just £30 buys a unit which will filter contaminated water into clean, germ free drinking water. In a 24 hour period, one unit can filter up to 60 litres which is more than enough water for an average family. One recent independent study of the ceramic filters in Zimbabwe and rural South Africa showed reduction in dysentery and diarrhoea of more than 80%, concluding that these filters are ‘an effective point-of-use intervention for reducing E-Coli and diarrhoea in African households.' Added to the tremendous health benefits that come from drinking clean water, the social benefits can also be profound, leading to children spending more time in school and adults spending more time at work. Absenteeism, due to sickness in the African school in which clean water kits were installed, immediately dropped from more than 45% to less than 5%.

This is an exciting project with huge potential worldwide. Access to a safe clean water supply is denied to well over 1 billion people worldwide so we are carefully monitoring the success of these units in Uganda, India and Peru with a view to distribute them to other countries with peoples in need.